Sand and blood
by Surburia
Summary: Roy tries his best to hold it together in Ishbal. Hughes is there to help. All the while Envy schemes in the background.  Blood and despair in the Ishbalan desert. Has both elements of the first anime/FMA:B/manga.
1. Chapter 1

**(A/N: Angst, Angst, Angst) **

It's cold and then it's hot. There is no medium. He's either shivering under a thin military issue blanket or sweating through his uniform. Roy inhales the dry air, scanning the area in front of him. It's the same in every direction: sand and leveled buildings, some still smolder even though it's been two weeks. The smell of singed hair haunts his nostrils. He will never be able to use a hairdryer without thinking of screams and flesh melting from corpses: From an all consuming flames, his flame. All this death came directly from him. He tries not to look at their faces. The first day he did. The first day had made him want to die. Now he tries not to focus too hard (just focus on his power), on controlling the elements in the air.

"Roy?" The voice catches him off guard and he can't keep his body from the surprised jerk. Hughes stands behind him hands at his side, looking concerned.

"Maes." He hesitates for a moment, trying to make his mind formulate words. "I'm getting tired of that look."

"What look?" Maes feigns and pushes his glasses up, a grin overcoming his tired overwrought features. "I thought you might be hungry. You're missing some of the best slop I've seen yet. You can almost tell what it is."

Roy laughs. It sounds dry and hollow to him, but as long as it appeases. "You really know how to sale it, Maes."

He turns away from the decimated town, the first place they had destroyed on arrival. After all they needed to set up a safe camp. The noise of the mess hall spills out from the tent only seeming to desecrate the area more. Foreign words in a native land.

Hawkeye looks pointedly at Roy and Armstrong greets them jovially as they enter. He gives her an apologetic shrug as Maes drops a tray in front of Roy.

"You're right, Maes I _can_ almost tell what it is." He stabs at the congealed mess, eating as quickly as possible. Trying not to think about the burnt meat (trying not to smell it) interspersed throughout the meal. Flesh sizzling, bubbling, blackening under flame. He gags, closing his eyes, trying to hide it from his comrades. He chews slowly, but can't swallow. The meat just seems to roll about like a rubbery ball of flesh, (human flesh). No, he seethes the word internally. Just swallow it. Look at them. None of them are having a problem. Hughes was saying something about Gracia to Armstrong, and then shit Hawkeye is looking at him, her golden eyes probing, a furrow in her brow, words ready to spill from her mouth. He grabs his glass of water and downs the whole thing. The meat, flesh, sliding down his throat. He can't eat any more. The idea makes his stomach churn and it takes all of his willpower not to gag again.

Hawkeye looks at him and he can tell she wants to say something, but it must be the look he gives her that stops her from voicing her concern. She looks so tired, they all look tired, but somehow Maes manages to keep the conversation light. Every time he says 'Gracia' his face lights up.

"I had a big lunch." Roy says and pushes his tray forward. "Hughes, you want my leftovers?" If he says it lightly, Maes might buy it- might not question him. Hughes looks like he's about to say something, his fork lingering in between his plate and mouth.

"What were you saying about Gracia?" Roy asks, already knowing that Hughes can tell something is wrong. Please pretend.

He hesitates for a moment, that same look, furrowed brow, and then he says "Oh." Raises an eyebrow. "Oh Gracia. Look at this picture she just sent me." The manic glint is absent from his eyes, his normal histrionics lessened, an act, but at least he plays along. He produces it and pushes it into Roy's hand. Gracia smiles up at him in black and white. "Isn't she beautiful?"

"Yes." Hughes has something to hold onto in this hell. In the blood and the sand, this black and white photo fastening him to reality. He hands the photo back. "You're lucky, Maes."

Hughes drops down next to him, extending his arms to either side of the tent and letting out a huge yawn.

Roy ducks just in time as Hughes arms swing his way. "Maes, you ever heard of personal space."

Hughes laughs, stifling the yawn with his other hand and flops back onto his sleeping bag.

"Roy I want to talk to you about something."

"If this is about Gracia, I've heard enough to last me the rest of the war."

"No. It's abou-"

"Hughes, I'm really not in the mood." He uses his friend's surname hoping he'll understand that Roy is serious about this.

Hughes stays quiet for a moment, and Roy thinks he's going to let the subject go. "I'm fine Maes." He doesn't make eye contact, but he can see Hughes out of the corner of his eye, his fingers picking lint from the cuff of his sleeve and he can tell he wants to voice something. "Roy. In the mess hall-"

"Really, Hughes I'm not up for this right now. I had a long day. I just want to sleep." And with that he reaches for the lantern its sparse light barely illuminating the interior of the tent. Hughes sighs, and begins to shrug himself out of his uniform. Roy snubs out the light and crawls beneath his sleeping bag.

"Roy-"

"Goodnight, Maes."

He rolls over and closes his eyes, pulling the thin blanket over his body. The cool air from outside filters in through the small cracks in the tent. He lies still focusing on his breathing, making it even and steady and soon he hears Maes roll over with an indignant huff, hissing something under his breath. He lies with his eyes open long after Hughes is asleep, long after the noise from the other tents has quieted and the desert is almost silent, punctuated by the occasional boom in the distant; miles away people are still dying, being murdered. He dreams of blood and twisting, burning bodies and awakes sometime in the middle of the night, pushing himself up, breathing hard, his breath coming in heavy puffs. When he does sleep it's what he sees. All he can see. A child holding a gun, the barrel shaking in his hand and Roy hand raised, shaking just as badly. And he knows he'll have to do it. It's only a few seconds of time, and he holds his breath, hoping to a god that isn't there, pleading in those moments, middle finger and thumb pressed together, heart beating a fast rhythm. Fight or flight. And then the child raises the gun and he doesn't think he just snaps. Oxygen that damn element, it's so easy to change the air, so easy to pull death out of nothing, to change a life giving substance into a weapon. The blast is so powerful that there's nothing left of the child when the flames have finished consuming. Even the gun is mostly melted to the charred cement floor.

He rubs at his eyes trying to slow his breathing, and suppress the memory. Hughes is still asleep, and he can see his slight form under the blanket in the thin wisps of light now creeping in from the tent flap. He lies back down knowing that reveille will sound soon, and another blood stained day will begin.

(I appreciate all reviews/ critiques. Thanks for reading. I want to mention Sevlow and Miskcat for providing me with inspiration to attempt my own FMA fic. )


	2. Chapter 2

(A/N: Thank you so much, Sevlow, Jenny Blake, Kira Temeki, and Shrandrial for reading and reviewing and Phanax Leminar for adding this story to your favorites! I hope this chapter doesn't disappoint. I'll try to update every week or two.

Roy looks around the mostly empty cafeteria. Most of the soldiers are still huddled in their tents, attempting to stay out of the midday sun, awaiting orders that were supposed to have been issued a day ago. His eyes linger on two men situated in the back of the room. Kimblee, his dark hair slicked back, waves his tattooed hands around in the midst of histrionics and laughs loudly at something his companion says. Roy doesn't know the alchemist well, but there's something about him, something that's off, evident even from the brief encounter he had with him. Maybe it was the manic snake like grin that had crept across his features as he said, "he looked forward to working with the flame alchemist."

"Roy!" He looks up as Hughes bounds over, snapping out of his reverie and groaning inwardly at the sight of his friend's bright demeanor. He rubs at his eyes aware of the dark circles and his pale complexion and hopes Hughes's won't say anything. He had managed to choke down a bit of breakfast, dry, rubbery eggs, minutes before while Hughes had ventured out to check for the mail delivery. But the small amount of food makes him feel sick. He rubs a hand through his hair.

"There's mail." Hughes grins wider and holds up a letter, moving it back and forth.

"Hmm. Let me guess." Roy says grabbing the envelope in order to stop Hughes' emphatic gesture. The pendulum movement making his head hurt. "Who would possibly send _you_ mail?"

"Of course it's from my baby. My bright wittle lovey-bunny." He pulls the letter back from Roy's grasp and kisses the envelope.

"Great, just what I wanted to hear."

"She's such a sweet heart." Hughes coos, sitting down next to Roy and practically salivating over the envelope. "And there's a package for you too." He adds as an afterthought.

Roy raises an eyebrow. "Who from?"

"I don't know, but Hawkeye had one too."

"Hawkeye?" He looks around the cafeteria trying to locate her.

"Mhmm…" Hughes says distantly, ripping the seal from the letter and donning a manic grin at the letter and a new picture from Gracia. This time she waves from the beach, the waves crashing behind her, her golden eyes bright in the sun.

Roy stands before Hughes' onslaught can begin, curious enough to be drawn outside into the squelching heat. He scans the desert camp for Hawkeye, but still can't find her.

He recognizes the writing on the crate instantly: the long scrawl of his teacher. His dead teacher who had coughed up his own lungs and drown in his blood. The one he had forsaken by joining the military. This is why Riza had one too, but how? A last hidden will? He heads back to the tent, feeling numb, for once not aware of the stifling heat and sits down. Every noise in the background: soldiers yelling over a card game a tent over and bawdy laughter fade into the background as he stares at the box, wanting to believe, but not believing. Why would his teacher bother to write him into a will after what he had done? That look of betrayal etched into his face as he died, blood running from his lips, pooling on the table, staining the papers underneath him bright red, those slow horrible gasps of pain and Roy had stood on looking in horror and his teacher had been right. What good came of this ability to use fire, to destroy? He had been naive to dream of saving this country's people, of helping them with alchemy. His fingers tremble over the crate and he can see a letter poking out from in-between the slightly warped wood. Without thinking he pulls on the edge of the envelope extracting it with one swift motion and again without thinking he tears it open, pulling out the folded note and quickly reads over the typed words. It is a will, a last testimony and in the crate is something his teacher had deemed him, a traitor worth having. His thoughts turn to Riza and he wonders what her father had sent her, he had left her with a souvenir already, flesh obstructed with an alchemic tattoo. He had used his own daughter to preserve his precious flame alchemy and in doing so he had corrupted her as well, had only continued the cycle, what a stupid man, to know of this power and deny Roy only to have him learn it from his daughter. If he had truly known of the atrocities this alchemy could make, why had he bothered, why he had written it down? Roy pushes the box away, and lets the letter drop, his hands shaking.

Shouting and screaming breaks through the barrier of his thoughts and Roy lifts his head. It's coming from outside and he recognizes the strangled mantra. An ishbalan mantra. His chest tightens as he pulls on his gloves, instincts kicking in, his heart speeding up. He pulls the tent flap back as a gunshot rings A young soldier holds a gun. His ears ring from the sudden noise, as the gunshot echos over the dunes. He can't see around the fray. Roy rushes forward, but is stopped by a violet flash of light and then a scream as blood sprays outwards. As he gets closer he sees the source of the sound and his stomach drops at the sight. An Ishbalan lies on his side in the sand. Half of the man's abdomen is missing, just blown away, pink innards spill from in-between his fingers, gurgled sounds escape his lips, and red eyes roll in his head. Kimblee stares down at his handiwork, a small smile on his lips. The young soldier with the gun stands near him, the gun still in his shaking hands as he stares down at the eviscerated man.

"I think that's the last one." Kimblee states calmly looking down at the dying man and turns on his heel. "Shows over." He says to the crowd around him. One of them is in awe of his alchemy and says so drawing close to The Crimson Alchemist. The man's eyes continue to roll, a low throaty gurgle issuing from his lips. A hand snakes outwards grasping at the sand in vain.

"You're going to leave him like this?" He says, voice surprisingly steady.

Kimblee shrugs. "He's already dead."

As if the man had heard him he opens his mouth, and looks like he is about to speak, blood coating his teeth, but then the liquid spills over his lips and runs down over his chin.

"He all yours flame." Kimblee says and flashes him a dark smile. The man takes in a rattling liquid breath and Roy raises his fingers. He knows how to adjust the air now. His first victim had died screaming, third degree burns on his body, skin sloughing off, eye boiling, because Roy hadn't known the right amount of power it took to kill a person. Now he can kill a person without much thought at all really. All it took was practice. He snaps and turns away, holding his breath as the flames consume their human tender. An Ishbalan, a man, a human reduced to nothing more than a short burst of heat rising up into the air and then settling back down, bones cracking and popping under the extreme temperature and then there's nothing but a blackened skeleton in the sand, the desert silent once again, free from the screams of pain.

(I appreciate all reviews and critiques.)


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